I do not know the details, it is just a trend I have noticed, like Panasonic's iAuto mode. But it seems likely that one criterion is avoiding blown highlights, by highlight priority metering, a feature already offered in some m4/3 cameras for example, and another is minimizing motion blur by using high enough shutter speed. The combination would then come close to my ideal for choice of analog gain level.

Anyway, perhaps a better solution in the end will be like Sony's approach of column parallel ADC with perfect matching of analog gain to the ADC's capabilities and no need for variable gain: ISO speed as just a recommendation for digital level adjustment with simple multiplication, or "single ISO speed sensors".

There are hints that Panasonic is using a similar approach in its GH2 sensor; for example, I think I read in an interview that the GH2 sensor produces digital output, not analog output for off-board ADC as with other Panasonic sensors. So maybe this approach will spread through the industry.

me ? I am just a grateful reader and that design decision was, I guess, done by T. Knoll way before Eric Chan started to work in Adobe Labs... I guess that was necessary for a ~real time UI... they couldn't redemosaick raw data sufficiently fast in real time to reflect end users' every mouse click-n-drag during their senseless play w/ sliders in ACR.

I'd be hard pressed to consider that a "vast majority". RPP is, I believe, a Mac-only option which puts severe limits on its user takeup. Raw Therapee is an open source platform that has limited development (I know a new version was brought out this past summer(?) after several years of no development - and yes, I know the original developer passed away, sadly) and depending on current/future development may not be as up to date for newer cameras. So both are limited in their user takeup. Back to the earlier question: What commercial software acts in the way you describe?

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me ? I am just a grateful reader and that design decision was, I guess, done by T. Knoll way before Eric Chan started to work in Adobe Labs... I guess that was necessary for a ~real time UI... they couldn't redemosaick raw data sufficiently fast in real time to reflect end users' every mouse click-n-drag during their senseless play w/ sliders in ACR.

The internal working space of ACR and LR is Referred Input Medium Metric (RIMM), which has ProPhoto RGB primaries with linear gamma. Temporary excursions are made to other color spaces and image decompositions, as needed, to suit the image processing.

In ACR, there are additional options to set the desired output color space (which is used to drive the histogram and on-screen preview image). These color conversions are done at the end of the image processing pipeline, after the UI-driven controls (e.g., Exposure) are done. In LR, there are also such options (e.g., in Export and Web), though they do not drive the displayed histogram, nor the on-screen preview image. The color conversions are handled in exactly the same way.

Note that when you change a slider in ACR/LR (e.g., Exposure), ACR/LR doesn't simply recalculate the new exposure value. It also has to re-evaluate many other things. This is because your adjusted exposure may influence many other image processing parameters (for example, a brightness-dependent color table, brightness-dependent tone or color masks, etc.).

The internal working space of ACR and LR is Referred Input Medium Metric (RIMM), which has ProPhoto RGB primaries with linear gamma. Temporary excursions are made to other color spaces and image decompositions, as needed, to suit the image processing.

Eric - what about using ACR to work w/ TIFF and JPG images ? do we still have conversion from their colorspaces to RIMM first (for example JPG in sRGB -> RIMM -> output color space) ? thank you.

RPP is, I believe, a Mac-only option which puts severe limits on its user takeup.

yes, "MAC only" - like Aperture (Apple) or Rawdeveloper (Iridient).

however you can run OS X in VmWare or Virtual Box on any PC w/ a proper virtualizaton supporting CPU and as RPP does not need QE/CI (the same, btw, is true for Rawdeveloper) it runs there just fine and moreover its performance in virtualized environment per $1 cost of your hardware is actually better than running it natively on Mac hardware (Hackintosh of course is the most cost effective solution).

plus again, Mac share is bigger among people who are involved in photography either on a pro basis or as amateurs/hobby.

Raw Therapee is an open source platform that has limited development (I know a new version was brought out this past summer(?) after several years of no development

on the contrary it is way more active right now vs when it was only Gabor... we even have here at least two people participating in development here - Emil Martinec and Michael Ezra (may be I misspelled the name).

however you can run OS X in VmWare or Virtual Box on any PC w/ a proper virtualizaton supporting CPU

Not a solution I'd venture many, even professional photograpehrs, would utilise. Unlike here, where the proportion is higher, most professional photogs aren't also computer engineers/programmers.

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plus again, Mac share is bigger among people who are involved in photography either on a pro basis or as amateurs/hobby.

That was the case in the past. Don't think the same holds true today. Mac is no longer the 'default' platform for graphics/photography.

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but yes, ACR/LR, are more "average Joe" friendly, no argument here.

Nice dig at all the professionals who 'make due' with a 'less than adequate' solution.

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are you talking about Gabor Horvath of RT or Gabor Shorr (aka Panoholic) of Rawnalyze ? I did not know that Gabor Horvath died

Sorry, I got them confused.

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RT is as current w/ new cameras as dcraw is = it is up to date (usual suspects like Sigma excluded - but Adobe's support for Sigma is as good as not supported).

Sure I understand dcraw gets updated. But how quickly compared to others? And, in my experience, dcraw isn't as good as ACR/LR or other software platforms. dcraw is what, I believe, Photomatix uses if you feed it raw images and even HDRSoft admits you're better off converting outside Photomatix and feeding TIFF files.

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no, I do not beat my wife

I'll take that as saying that no commercial software works the way you describe.

That was the case in the past. Don't think the same holds true today. Mac is no longer the 'default' platform for graphics/photography.

I did not say 'default' platform... my point is that the marketshare of Mac is way bigger in graphics/photography (and if you go up the ladder it becomes more Mac and less Win - and note that I am not using any Mac hardware myself - just OSX/RPP), for example - take P1 U2U forums and compare the activity of C1/Mac vs C1/Win sections - it is around 50/50... but we digress from internal spaces of ACR/LR and from what exposure slider is actually doing in various raw converters ...

Sure I understand dcraw gets updated. But how quickly compared to others?

as often as ACR/LR.

the problem is not how soon you can open the raw file (genuinely new formats are very rare thing) - the problem is how good is your camera profile (.icc/.icm or .dcp) available (from OEM or supplied w/ a raw converter or from a 3rd party or self built).

And, in my experience, dcraw isn't as good as ACR/LR or other software platforms.

dcraw (or some refactored libraries like libraw built from dcraw information) is a basis on top of which some raw converters are build (it is used to get information from raw files and as a source of matrix profiles sometimes) but they might (and do) use their own demosaicking, denoising, etc... so a proper raw converter built using dcraw is not just a gui over dcraw.

I sometimes wonder if someone will replace David Coffin if he decides on day (or is forced for some reason) to stop developing DCRAW. He is a very entushiastic person, and he loves what he does late night in his room everytime a new camera format appears. But he is a single person, and I doubt there are many individuals out there capable of (or willing) doing what he does.

Amazing that we customers put up with Camera manufacturers that do not document the file format that will allow us to read our own negatives in the future.

One would think that Canikon could spare a few hours of developer time to make available an example implementation/SDK that decompressed/read the data from each of their raw formats, and presented it as human readable tagged data. As long as no actual image processing was carried out, it should be a lot simpler for them that for someone without access to internal documentation/human resources.

Statistics on my website indicate both Windows and Mac being about 45% of the visitors. I guess most visitors I have are photo geeks.

The way I see it, users choose the operating system that best suit their needs. For me it was the only reason I switched from Linux to Windows and than to Mac.

Vendors support the OS-es of their choice. That choice may depend own the developers competence. It's not as easy to change OS as to change shirt. There are application frameworks that can be used on multiple OS-es line Qt. Bibble Pro uses Qt and is available on Windows, Linux and Mac. But even using a library like Qt you need to put up with idiosyncrasies of different platforms for color management, sound and so on.

Eric - what about using ACR to work w/ TIFF and JPG images ? do we still have conversion from their colorspaces to RIMM first (for example JPG in sRGB -> RIMM -> output color space) ? thank you.

Yes, the source color space of the output-referred image (TIFF, JPEG, PSD, etc.) will be converted to RIMM temporarily for the purposes of adjustments in ACR/LR. For example, if you started from an in-camera JPEG shot in sRGB, the conversion would be done from sRGB to RIMM.